Practice vs. Theory for your peaceful being.
So when it comes to our minds and our souls, it makes sense that we need to be as diligent about nourishing our selves. And when I think about ‘life’ and breath and spirit and what it takes for these to flourish and be nourished, I just don’t think “accomplishment”. In fact, I think exactly the opposite. I think stillness, ‘being’, breathing, connecting. And yet what I see more of is ‘doing’, running, talking, phoning, emailing, dropping off, picking up, organizing, marketting, networking… people ‘working’ them selves into a frenzy.
How Many? How Much? …. Everyday!
But more important than any theory about how many, how much, when, with whom is that we practice regularly. And that we find a practice that is right for us, so that rather than asking: “How many?” or “How much?” We can feel and say: “I am so glad I can get up and practice my life every day. I love it and I’m good at it. My life brings me peace of mind and wellness, contentment, security, community, appreciation, confidence, kindness, love, health and enough of everything I need”; despite the ups and down of everyday life.
Wellness and Connection – Well being doesn’t have to “cost the earth.”
I like having a little lull in my obligations. It gives me time to get to my reading and listening – taking time to learn and hear what others have to say about the things I’m most interested in.
So this morning I’ve listened to a couple of TED blogs – “Ideas worth Spreading”. It is a brilliant web site on which you could spend days enjoying taped talks from conferences about “ideas worth spreading”.
The first one I’m just going to post here so you can go and listen for your self… it’ll take you a little over 15 minutes and I believe it’ll get you thinking about your own wellness and how it doesn’t have to “cost the earth” for the world to be happy.
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/nic_marks_the_happy_planet_index.html
And then ironically once I get you thinking, I’m going to ask you to return to your body and check in on your wellness factor that way. Nic Marks touches on “The 5 Ways to Well Being” and 4/5 of them are directly connected to our connection to ourselves and to others and how we interact in the world. In fact, even the 5th which is about lifelong learning is really physical if you think about it… Ensler suggests that story telling really helps us absord learning into our bodies. And so I offer this quote from Eve Ensler – whose TED blog I also watched and I invite you to turn your attention to your own well being and how you are relating to the world. (If you’re curious – go ahead and search Eve Ensler in the search engine at the TED site.)
“Stories are the way that we transmit information where it goes into our bodies. I think the world is very much in our bodies. It’s a body world. The species really exists in the body. And I think there’s a real significance in us attaching our bodies to our heads. That that separation has created a divide that is often separating purpose from intent. And the connection between body and head often brings those things [purpose and intent] into union.”
I also happen to think that our physical connection to the world – when really mindful – helps us practice this union between purpose and intent. Our physical learning, growth and change reflect that same growth in our intellect and spirit. The body is our tangible connection to the abstract. Yoga, for example, can employ all 5 ways to well being: connection (breath); action (strength and stretch movements), taking notice (mindful movement), learning (new ways to move your body and find comfort) and giving (we offer our practice to a specific intention). I encourage you to explore other ways in which you can combine all 5!
Here’s to finding ways to practice joining our intent and our purpose as we live our lives in happy and healthy ways. What we do for ourselves, we do for the world and vice versa.
Be well and peaceful,
zan
Learning about Diabetes
Hi,
I just finished reading “Diabetes Rising” (2010) by Dan Hurley – great accessible, narrative book that sheds light on both type I and type II diabetes. Well sheds light for those of us who don’t have a medical background ;o)
A couple of quotes for you…
“Preventing type 2 diabetes is not just about food, of course. There are the other issues, such as ensuring adequate levels of vitamin D and limiting exposure to persistent organic pollutants, addressed in Part 2 of this book. The other biggie is ‘eneregy expenditure’: figuring out ways to get people to burn more of the calories they so efficiently consume.”
Dr. Arloski of Real Balance Global Wellness LLC ( www.realbalance.com) spoke so much about how important our community support is in our endeavours to create change – so these statistics speak volumes:
“A recent study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that over the course of 32 years, a person’s chance of becoming obese jumps by 57 percent if he or she has a friend who becomes obese, 40 percent if a sibling becomes obese (no matter how far away that sibling lives), and 37 percent if a spouse does. [I find it interesting that friends have a stronger influence than family or even a spouse!] Neighbors had little influence; friends and family members of the same sex had more influence than those of the opposite sex; and statistically significant effects could be seen even from friends-of-friends.”
And lastly – I just think this is a great line!
“…I had to wonder how long doctors would persist in looking for the causes of diabetes – and the reasons for its relentless rise – solely within the islets of Langerhans, rather than in the aisles of Wal-Mart.”
This book also reminded me that wellness is on a continuum – so many life/environment factors will interfere with our wellness and still, we have the possibilities for navigating all of this with awareness and attention to kindness, comfort and compassion for ourselves.
And so it goes…with joy!
I haven’t made the time or even thought much about adding to this blog for quite some time…I think it’s about 279 days according to my linked-in profile. I am not going to beat my self up about it. It’s obviously not something that fights for my attention. Besides, it doesn’t have a chance with the competition: a couple of part-time jobs, 3 children – one in each of elementary, middle and high school – and all needing a personal chauffeur at least 3 days a week to get them to music, friends or home from play rehearsals. Then there’s the two dogs, a cat and my kind and loving partner who gets the short end of the stick too often. A blog just isn’t a commitment I can add to my responsibilities on a regular basis.
Last week end I watched Julie and Julia with Meryl Streep and Amy Adams. In the ‘making of the movie’ section of the video, one of the commentators mentions that both Julie and Julia found a passion in food that led them to a commitment that helped them find success. And, naturally since I’m striving for some form of success in my own life the first thing that I notice about their drive, their commitment, their unrelenting ability to complete a monumental task was paved…with no children.
Perhaps this is an obstacle I’ve hid behind, or some form of self-pity I wallow in; I’ve tried looking at it from all angles. I’ve tried imagining hiring a nanny and throwing caution to the wind and going off to find a ‘commitment’ that would bring me fame and glory. I’ve imagined spending every penny on cleaning women, working outfits, more education and professional development so that the community will know me so that I’ll be hired and have more work than I know what to do with – saying yes to the projects I like and turning clients away to other professionals I know and like.
And then I realize a couple of very important things. My children bring me fame and glory and I made a commitment to them years ago; I not only know them, I love them. I mean I really love them. I love to be with them. I love their individual spirits, their relentless energy for more of life, their willingness to participate in our lives in every way. I don’t want some substitute mother to share in their joys and respond to their woes. I don’t mind when others do; on the contrary I’m grateful for the variety of input they receive in their lives and I value the differences they each possess and the differences they seek out in advice from friends, family, teachers… it does take a village. And yet what we have is a solid relationship among the 5 of us. We all enjoy being together despite our differences and our individual abilities to drive the others crazy from time to time. We know this about each other. We are each others best friends, mentors, truth-sayers and button pushers. In the end, I guess I couldn’t be more grateful for the situation I am in. And the blog posts will have to wait.
And as I write this, I realize there are other women out there saying the exact opposite: If I didn’t work my butt off to have a cleaning woman and help for my children, we couldn’t survive. And this is yet another truth. We’re all working out butts off in different ways for different goals and rewards. I hope at least we build enough awareness to enjoy whatever is going on in our lives and how we are practicing our ways.
And so it goes… the blog posts will have to wait. And while I’m not ‘on line’ making a name for my self, I am busy working on other areas of my life-long-learning and growth and development. And I’m learning that there’s not all that much to say that’s different from last year. I’m finding some growth and truth in the silence of it all. I’m practicing more meditation and yoga and ‘being’ in different ways in my life and learning that…
so it goes… Enjoy it!
In peace and kindness,
zan
Suzanne Ballantyne
‘simple practice’ – individual coaching and contract work; helping individuals and organizations develop healthy practices.
Women & Success: Building more awareness in life & at work
We achieve this way of thinking and living when we come to understand who we really are and how this world we live in is really just illusion. We are connected to and part of something so much bigger than the jobs we do, the families we come from and the things we keep in our homes. We are nature. We are pieces of God. We are little creators connected to the web of Life.
Reality vs. Perception at Mid-life – Go for Joy!
Yesterday at breakfast my husband read me a quote out of Jacqueline Kelm’s first book: Appreciative Living – The principle of appreciative inquiry in personal life (2005). Here is the quote:
“We don’t live in a world of reality, we live in a world of perceptions.”
- Gerard Simmons -
Last night I was on the phone with my 31-year-old niece and she was telling me about a visit to a massage therapist to whom she went to work out a kink she had from running. The masseur told her she shouldn’t be a runner; she didn’t have the body to be a runner. And yet, she grew up in a family where both her parents run – a lot!
The two of us talked briefly about how much we are influenced by our families – sometimes even forcing our selves to do things that don’t really suit us but that we do anyway because we want to feel like we are part of the family, that we belong. And there’s nothing wrong with this. I am sure my niece likes to go for a run – it has lots of pleasant associations for her like being with her parent(s) and the good feeling we all get after exercising – the satisfaction, the good fatigue, the feeling of a stronger body, the healthy appetite etc. etc. And yet, my niece also told me she’s never liked running as much as some other sports and so in some ways it just seemed such a relief to hear this man say she doesn’t need to be ‘a runner’.
How many of us have been living our lives in some way that doesn’t really feel all that great to us but we’re just so used to it and so conditioned to live in such a way that we don’t ask any questions; we just carry on. At what point do we allow our perception of things to become reality for us? We might even have learned a way of ’coping’ with our ‘reality’ in ways that include negative thoughts and negative self-talk but we’ve never thought of stopping to ask our selves, “Do I really want to keep doing this?” or “Do I really care if I maintain this practice in my family? The one I’m raising now?” or “How come I’ve never taken an art course? I’ve always liked art even though no one else in my family liked art.” Often we just accept our lives as our ‘reality’ rather than just a learned perception.
As we grow up and arrive at that stage in life where we begin to question assumptions and our ‘reality’; we might realize it is just our perception based on our upbrining and experiences. Many of us get a little (or a lot) introspective about life and aging and we may start asking “what’s this all about?” In fact this is a documented stage of adult development (Gail Sheehy, Kathleen Brehoney), usually taking place in women a little earlier than in men but very common at mid-life – so anywhere from 35 – 55 years of age.
The one thing I have learned about this stage and how to deal with it - how to reach out to your self and to trying new things; to open up your mind and heart to new possibilities - is that we are better at it when we do it with joy. Or perhaps, it’s more likely that adults develop to this stage because they have some joy in their lives; I’m not exactly sure which is the egg and which the chicken. But I recently came across this quote and realized how true it is:
“Psychologists who in recent years have taken up the study of positive emotions, find that joy widens one’s view of the world and expands imaginative thought. It activates. It makes both physical and intellectual exploration more likely, and it provides reward for problems solved or risks taken. Through its positive energies, it heals as well. One joy, the Chinese believe, scatters a hundred griefs, and certainly it can be an anitdote to fatigue and discouragement. Into those set back by failure, joy tranfuses hope.” Kay Redfield Jamison in Exuberance – The Passion for Life (2004)
Coaches and therapists typically ask their clients to spend time discovering what brings them joy. They may ask them to try some new things and see how it makes them feel because we know that inducing feelings of joy in a person helps them to open up their minds to new possibilities for their lives. It gets our clients unstuck; able to see opportunity in their lives. Most importantly, it opens up our hearts to the rest of our lives.
I don’t know yet because I am only 45 years old but I have a feeling that opening up the heart is one of the keys to staying engaged in life as we age and helping us cross over when life as we ‘perceive’ it comes to an end.
In peace and kindness,
Suzanne “zan” – www.simplepractice.net – Life Coach in Cary/Raleigh, NC
Work – at home, on the career path, in the garden.
It’s late and I am the type of person who tries to get 8 hours of sleep for my sanity and my immune system. However, this build-your-own-career while parenting three children, volunteering in the community, learning about networking and planting a garden does call for a late night once or twice a week. I am trying to limit it to once – just to get that little extra done.
I debate whether or not it’s time to let go of one of my part-time jobs that I keep for income and occasionally wonder if I would’t be better off in a “real job”. I only linger with this thought briefly as I know deep down I’d be ignoring my own dream to reach out to people, to continue to bring my message to the world about peace of mind, self-leadership and happiness. (see my favorite quote about happiness on my website: http://www.simplepractice.net/aboutsuzanne.html)
I also realize that creating your own career path allows a type of freedom that any job I could go out and start now would never allow me… like say for instance, going to harvest some bamboo in the middle of the morning on a Tuesday; or reading to grade four in the middle of a Monday afternoon; or even an hour walk with the dogs who I couldn’t leave in the car ’til my lunch hour; not to mention the commute and the vacation restrictions. I know it’s not for everyone; however I am grateful every day for the possibilities, and one day at a time they play them selves out.
I continue to grow an awareness of my habits. Today I watched a short video at www.selfgrowth.com about Steven Covey’s, 7 Habits of Highly Successful People and I am glad I happened upon it. I already knew about them, and! I am human and I need reminders every day; I am glad I know that. I choose to continue to do what it takes to remind my self and to stay on my path.
Reading over one of my previous blogs I realized that I had introduced our garden – which has now been tilled – with much thanks to my loving, gifted and hard working partner. He has also dug the holes for the bamboo posts which sit majestically (we found some pretty good sized stalks!) around the garden plot. We have four boxes constructed out of treated cedar and the beautiful beginnings of cabbage, broccoli, basil and onions on the kitchen window sill. We still need to finish placing the fence around the posts and I am a little late but I am going to plant some spinach and lettuce tomorrow after I work the soil and add some fertilizer. The rest of the plants will go outside in a couple of weeks. All this to say the scavenger hunt for the bamboo was entirely worth it! Just another reminder of what I’m grateful for…
Tonight, my youngest came and asked me: “Are you coming up?” He likes to be ‘tucked in and many nights I oblige him; what’s not to like about snuggling up to one of your favorite people and telling each other you love them? Yet sometimes I realize I just cannot interupt the rhythm of my work and in this case I know my husband is available for the bedtime practice. I gently explained my situation to him and he understood, quietly saying: “Okay” while withdrawing from the family room where I am working. To my pleasant surprise and yet not uncharacterisically when I think about it, my 14 year old daughter stepped in and “loved” her brother in my place, gently embracing him and leading him upstairs. I know I’ve been a good model; I also honor the unique beauty in each of my three children and I believe the respect I have tried to show them as often as possible is starting to come back to me. This too is part of the balance of parenting – being ‘there’ for them and staying ‘here’ for you in a kind and loving way. What kind of a model would I be if I didn’t pursue my own dreams?
As you know if you’ve read any other things I’ve written or looked at other information about me on the web, one of the big focusses of my work is a healthy work/life balance. I’ve heard others say there’s no such thing and yet who said balance is static? It’s positively! dynamic and the value of being able to find your balance – even if you stumble from time to time – is that it allows you to have all that you love in your life without any big sacrifices. At least this is how I see it. For someone like me with a renaissance soul that thrives on lifelong learning and variety in every day, this is the only way to live with joy and peace in my heart.
Wishing you the same, in peace and kindness,
Suzanne “zan” – www.simplepractice.net – life coach in Cary/Raleigh, NC
Discovering Kindness… again
I went on a 2-day silent retreat last week end. It was my second silent retreat. The first one was 5 days. My husband made a comment or two before I left that suggested these retreats are like going to the spa… far from it. I am only a beginner but I am learning that silent retreats are intense personal and spiritual work. And it’s worth it!
There is a documentary called “Touch the Sound” about Evelyn Glennie – a drummer and performing artist who has been deaf since the age of 8. In the movie, Glennie says, “Silence is probably one of the heaviest sounds you’re ever likely to experience.” Of course I cannot imagine being deaf but I am aware of how difficult it is for most people to sit in silence; including me. We don’t like the silence for some reason and yet we come from it and we return to it at the beginning and the end of our lives. I am coming to enjoy the silence more and more; it calms the mind, helps with focus and allows for profound thoughts to stir.
It occured to me that days of silence and meditation are akin to the “morning pages” that Julia Cameron asks us to write in The Artist’s Way. Over time you discover what thoughts keep coming to the surface. With this knowledge you gain wisdom into your deepest fears and needs. These are the things in life that block our flow, our progress, our success and sometimes our arteries. We cannot clear them out until we face them down. And we do this with love and kindness for ourselves. We grow to understand more and more that the love and kindness we give to our selves, we give to the whole world.
The difficult part for me – and I know I’m not alone – is the ongoing practice of maintaining loving awareness so that I can continue to be kind to my self – especially in difficult moments. It is so difficult to override our knee jerk reactions – the habits we’ve had since childhood in some cases – to moments that make us cringe. It’s in these moments precisely that we want to stop, find loving awareness and bring gentle kindness to our hearts so that we can keep them open and grow them deeper, larger, wider still. The more I love my self, the more I love. The more I love, the more peace and happiness I create.
Coincidentally, one of the retreat teachers was deaf. It was necessary for each of us or for one of the other participants to sign the first letter of every word spoken so that Jane (not her real name) could understand what was being said during the opening and closing meetings and during short question periods.
I am familiar with the signing alphabet so I had the opportunity to speak to Jane while signing the first letter of everything I said. I found my self being grateful for Jane’s deafness. I was forced – in a very good way – to speak slowly and deliberately. For someone who can talk like the wind, sputtering out words that are often non-essential and gratuitous, this was a humbling experience. I actually thought of and mentioned it to my family when I returned home – to no avail. And yet, the more I participate in these retreats and these practices of loving awareness and sitting and walking meditations, the more I model this stillness, this peacefulness, this kindness and presence for my children. This alone is worth the work of kindness.
In peace and kindness,
Suzanne “zan” – www.simplepractice.net - life coach, speaker in Cary/Raleigh, NC
Work/Life/Adventure Balance
To borrow a term from Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin, today I spent some of my “life energy” gathering some bamboo from a wooded area not too far from my home. This is one of our favourite spots to run the dogs. One day my husband and I took a new trail and came across a large pile of bamboo. Further investigation led us to a nearby home that had obviously been harvesting or thinning the bamboo out of their yard.
Our intention is to build a fence.
After checking our email, walking the dog and doing some administrative work, my husband and I went off on our bamboo adventure and spent about 90 minutes cutting and cleaning several long – 15 ft? – pieces of bamboo which we then attached to the roof of the car complete with a hazard ribbon tied to one of the stems at the back.
We got it all home safely. The idea is to replace an ugly chain link fence that stretches from our garage across to the fence that joins that neighbour’s yard. I don’t know how long it will be before we get around to building the fence – hopefully this spring. I just felt so resourceful and grateful to find enough wood to do the job without spending a penny beyond a little gas to get it home.
No, we weren’t working for money for those 90 minutes but we have saved our selves hundreds in fencing materials so in a way we did get paid for our work.
I’ll be blogging a lot about this as my husband and I continue on our adventures developing two businesses of our own. We realize in some ways we’ll have to work harder than we’ve ever worked and we also know the freedom that comes from being your own boss. And today was another example. Wednesday we’ll be tilling the yard to start our garden for the summer so we can grow our own vegetables.
Suzanne or “zan” is the creator of ‘simple practice’ – www.simplepractice.net – Life coach, speaker in Cary/Raleigh, NC
